The road safety fallacy
The recurring call for bicycle helmets is a classic example of the Airplane Fallacy. Well-intended, but treating symptoms instead of tackling the cause. And that creates more problems than it solves.
Nobody is against road safety. Unsafe streets are one of the biggest annoyances of the Dutch. Interest groups, experts and politicians have been asking for more attention and urgency on this theme for decades. But our focus is mainly on the number of victims and how we can better protect them. As a result, we miss essential information about the causes. And we talk about well-intentioned, but ineffective and even harmful measures such as protective clothing for potential victims. Together, we would have a much greater positive impact if we escaped our Airplane Fallacy.
AIRPLANE FALLACY
During World War II, engineers studied the damage to aircraft returning from missions over enemy territory [1]. To reduce the number of aircraft lost, they reinforced the areas with the most damage. However, the number of aircraft lost remained high.
Hungarian mathematician Abraham Wald noticed that the data was only collected by looking at the returning planes. He argued that this creates an important blind spot. The planes that were shot down are missing from the assessment!
This means that the places with bullet holes are precisely the ones that do not need extra protection. After all, that is how the pilots could still return safely. So it is much more likely that the places without bullet holes show where the planes are vulnerable. Planes that were hit there did not return.
The Airplane Fallacy is a logical fallacy in which a focus on data that has already gone through a certain selection process leads to the wrong conclusions.
The error in Road Safety thinking
This logical but tragic error has been seen in the discussion about road safety for decades. Often driven by doctors or relatives, calls are made to better protect road accident victims. This is then adopted by existing road safety organisations, on TV, radio and in the newspapers and by politicians. How does the same ‘Airplane Fallacy’ play a role here?
We see a large and growing group of victims with head injuries coming to the Emergency Department. A general trend (an increase in injuries as a result of falls) but also visible among road accident victims. That must be incredibly traumatic to be confronted with that day in, day out. Just like with the traumatic impact of losing a loved one, it is a logical human reflex to seek a solution for this [2]. We see that the person involved in road accidents develops a story as a grief mechanism: “what if he/she had done something differently?” or “how can we prevent this in the future?” [3].
But just like with airplanes, our attention to road victims means that we mainly know their details: who they are, what kind of transportation they used, and what trauma they had. Over the years, we have become accustomed to discussing the victims by means of transportation: “the number of road deaths on bicycles is increasing” [4].
We see the same now that hospitals have collected data in the context of the discussion about the increase in accidents with fatbikes and e-bikes. Below is the counting list that all ER doctors received from VeiligheidNL . But can we also see now what is missing here?
Just as engineers use bullet holes to reinforce airplanes, the data we collect in this way is used to discuss how we can better protect victims. No one will deny that all victims brought to the ER would have benefited from protective clothing. This also makes it seem like a logical strategy to implement this as a policy. But - just like with airplanes - we lack crucial information to arrive at truly effective interventions.
What we should ALSO want to know!
Instead of just looking at the victims that are brought in, we should look much more closely at the underlying mechanisms of road safety:
1. We should want to know the KEY DETAILS OF CRASHES. Following an earlier call on this, more and more organisations are showing accident data in the form of so-called Collission Matrices. In these, we see all parties involved in each accident. Information that says more about what exactly is going on on the street. This information is crucial if we really want to seriously limit the suffering and trauma in traffic instead of just mitigating the consequences.
In the Netherlands, the Centraal Bureau voor de Statistiek showed this last year for the first time for traffic deaths, with totals for the period 2019-2023 [5]. Where we immediately see that most cyclists and pedestrians die in a collision with a driver of a motorized vehicle. But in all recent reports on road safety we do not see that at all. 'Cycling victims' are therefore usually not victims of cycling, but of something else. In the data on Fatbikes we also see that: the victims and their means of transport are identical to their market share. That means that it is unlikely that that explains anything of their injuries.
Every time we fail to explicitly discuss the underlying causes of suffering and trauma, we inadvertently normalize danger. We suggest that cycling and walking are dangerous, when the real danger comes from motorized vehicles. Without addressing this, this primary cause has only grown in number, size, weight, and power. And the distraction for those who need to drive it safely has only increased. We see this in transport minister Barry Madlener who calls for more bicycle helmets on the same day [5] and at the same time wants to increase the speed limit [6].
2. We should want to understand the MORAL DIFFERENCES between victims. If we group victims based on their own mode, we miss essential differences between groups of victims. There will always be planes that simply crash, but from a safety perspective, they are fundamentally different from those that are shot down. In the CBS data, we also see two categories: people who die without and with the involvement of another party.
We must view the first group in the light of other ‘accidental falls’. Every five days, one person dies as a result of a fall from a bicycle. Tragic, but in those same five days, no fewer than 95 people die as a result of another type of fall [8]. Take into account that we – and especially the elderly – increasingly cycle more often and further. This seems to hint at cycling being intrinsically a very safe activity compared to many other things people fall and die with.
But the second group are real traffic victims: people who die as a result of a collision by/with another person. The 658 cyclists and 228 pedestrians who died as a result of such a collision should instead fall into the same category as other human-to-human violence. Usually unintentional, of course. These kinds of numbers would be completely unacceptable in any other domain of our lives. Where is the public outrage about this? Why are the doctors not addressing this head on? What if instead of focusing on protective measures for cyclists, we focused on eliminating the key sources of danger on our streets? As a bonus, there would immediately also be more safety for all 1,667 people who have now died in a collision with someone in a motorized vehicle. In this way, we would much more effectively reduce the number of traumatized people on all sides and the traffic violence in our public space.
领英推荐
3. We should want to know the FULL COMPLEXITY. By definition, our expertise gives us a limited view of the entire system. We must therefore always be very careful so that our interventions do not lead to unwanted negative effects. Just like with any operation and just like with any medicine. So be careful if you only see the symptoms and do not yet know the underlying causes well. The aircraft engineers discovered this thanks to a mathematician. Doctors and experts should therefore seek cooperation with other disciplines and people who have been working on traffic hazards for decades.
Prevent negative impacts
Other disciplines can, for example, say that strong signals come from Denmark that promoting helmets leads to an expected and significant drop in cycling rates, especially among vulnerable groups such as children [9]. Through this dynamic traffic actually becomes more dangerous for everybody! Experienced people from other disciplines can also tell you that bicycle helmets lead to more dehumanization of cyclists [10], have negative effects on the behavior of motorists [11], and lead to more dangerous behavior of cyclists themselves [12]. They know the enormous positive effects of the Dutch cycling culture on the sustainability and liveability of our cities, on the social costs of our mobility system and on the physical, mental and social health of the population [13]. We should therefore be extremely careful about introducing barriers to this. In light of all this knowledge, we should not only aim for safe cycling, but first and foremost for much more cycling. And for much fewer car trips.
Historians like Peter Norton can explain how traffic violence originated in the 1920s [14]. Activists like Maartje Van Putten , leader of the Stop the Murder of Children movement 50 years ago and now active in the Rechtvaardige Straat , can help us understand the dynamics surrounding interventions on our streets. The Fietsersbond and MENSenSTRAAT have been working for decades to curb the speed of motorized vehicles in particular. And my own work as a scientist builds on international insights in how the limitations in our thinking about traffic violence influences policy [15], media [16] and the broader field of road safety [17].
Open up our thinking
If we don't only want to alleviate the consequences of crashes, but really reduce the suffering and trauma on our streets, then we need to question the limitations of our thinking broadly. The only way to do that is by working together with all disciplines that can help to understand the complexity well. And by always taking into account the full complexity of road safety. Let us connect all the people who think about this from different disciplines and backgrounds. And let's try together to not only fix the planes, but to end the war itself.
SOURCES
[3] Kwakman, E., Te Br?mmelstroet, M. & van Emmerik, A. (2024). ‘In the name, she lives on’: How Survivors and Relatives Narrate Traffic Crashes in Response to Media Coverage. Mobilities, accepted for publication
Associate Professor and Vice Dean at Aalto University
3 个月Marco, link 9 in the reference list isn't working...
This is discussed in more detail in my book https://rdrf.org.uk/death-on-the-streets-cars-and-the-mythology-of-road-safety/ Also see our work on the web site www.rdrf.org.uk
B2B Marketing | Creating effective content for customer acquisition, customer retention, brand engagement, and lead generation.
3 个月Remember the Tullock Spike thought experiment? Supports the view that car/van speed, driver comfort, isolation & distraction are key issues for safety of all road users. What amount of hi-vis body armour protects pedestrians against speeding e-scooters on pavements? https://bluefieldsafety.com/2019/06/as-safe-as-you-want-to-be
Managing Director at Pavement Innovations Ltd
3 个月It’s on your head when a child falls from their bicycle and gets a life changing injury, why are you so obsessed with ignoring the risks of this occurring? In my book like wearing a crash helmet on a horse or in a formula 1 car is clearly the right thing to be doing, you oppose protecting the vulnerable, I don’t get your attitude and where your coming from.!
Urban Furniture Designer and Producer
3 个月Agree, a helmet gives a false sense of safety. Instead of protecting from traumas let's minimise the possibility of an accident. That is to say, let's work on the cause, less on the consequences. The easiest and most effective thing is to start wearing a bright-colour long-sleeve shirt and gloves. Especially on a sunny day and before dusk.